Community Corner

Food Bank of SJ Facing Crisis in Funding, Donations

Shortfalls have left the aid organization looking for help from the state and the public.

In the warehouse at the Food Bank of South Jersey, a lonely case of Pop Tarts sits on the floor of a rack space that stretches empty to the ceiling, 20 feet above.

Aisles that are typically jammed with pallets of cans and boxes are wide enough and empty enough to run a three-man 100-yard dash with ease.

And not far away, shelves of loose cans and boxes of cereal are mostly empty, save for the golden glow of hundreds of cans of corn.

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It's part of a one-two punch—a funding shortfall and decreased donations—that has hit the Pennsauken-based organization hard this year. CEO Val Traore called in representatives from the 240 agencies—mostly local food banks and soup kitches—throughout Burlington, Camden, Gloucester and Salem counties Wednesday, exhorting them to put pressure on state government, while also giving them some bad news: costs to their agencies are going up by more than 12 percent for the foreseeable future.

Traore honed in on the funding issue, bringing up the to the Food Bank and other aid organizations from the Delaware River Port Authority, and told those gathered to reach out to their legislators and directly to Gov. Chris Christie’s office in an effort to bring public help.

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Beside her as she spoke were stacks of paper plates with messages from the beneficiaries of local food banks, which Traore said put a human face on the need.

“We’re hoping that’s going to reverberate throughout Trenton,” she said.

Besides trying to enlist the government’s aid, Traore said the Food Bank is trying to close a $300,000 funding gap by reaching out to their regular donors, hoping to get doubled contributions from some.

Though the organization has been able to stay solvent thanks to good financial management, Traore said the long-term outlook is bleak, if they can’t get more help.

“I can’t keep taking that kind of hit, year after year,” she said.

In addition to that operating loss, the Food Bank is also facing decreased donations from individuals and companies. Coupled with an increase of 70,000 people needing assistance, that’s meant it’s been a challenge to keep their warehouse stocked, Traore said.

Those difficulties ripple outward, as several agency representatives said after the meeting.

Sue Long, who works with Grace Baptist Church in Haddon Township, said her church’s food pantry used to be able to handle their demand with local donations, but with more people coming for help and lines out the door, they had to put pride aside.

“You’ve got to feed the people that are coming your door, so we had to reach out to the Food Bank,” she said.

Long said skyrocketing food prices at grocery stores have been a big factor, and her church has urged people to give cash donations instead of canned goods. That way, she said, they can get more than they possibly could elsewhere.

“We can double it here…that is the key,” Long said.

For Pat Scott of Mt. Carmel UAME Chuch in Paulsboro, the Food Bank is a safety net her local food bank needs more than ever. After one recent food distribution, they were left with nearly nothing as a backup in their pantry.

“We had our shelves totally wiped out for the first time,” Scott said. “We came just shy of giving out IOUs.”

And while it’s been harder to get quality and quantity—Scott said eggs are almost never an option, and they’re drowning in corn—without the Food Bank to bolster their supply, the Mt. Carmel food bank would be in serious trouble.

“Times being as they are, we had the kind of turnout last month that we usually have at Thanksgiving,” Scott said. “I don’t know what’s going to happen at Thanksgiving."


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